Last in the Family Line
by zero-damage
Summary: Persona 4. Naoto Shirogane: five to sixteen, and nine moments in-between.


_A/N: An older, Naoto-centric fic. One-shot (because those are generally what I do)_

* * *

**1.**

It's late November, at seven o'clock in the morning, and Naoto's five years old when the postcard arrives in the mail. Yakushiji-san tries to hide it from her.

"The wrong address," he tells her. Naoto knows he isn't telling the truth; she recognizes the handwriting. The postcard also has a picture of a flag she knows from the atlas in her grandfather's study.

The postcard is from France. The accident happened there too, twelve days ago. Naoto explains this to Yakushiji-san.

He looks at her for a moment, then leans down and places the card in her hands.

After breakfast, Naoto takes the card upstairs to her room and holds it up to the window. The photograph on the front is of a flag flying next to a stone arch and her father's writing is scrunched up corner to corner. She kneels on the wooden floor to read it, but she doesn't know all the words and at one point her eyes get blurry and she has to stop. Yakushiji-san would help her, but he's out on an errand. Her grandfather hasn't spoken to her since the funeral and she doesn't think he'd want to see the card at all.

Naoto stands, walks to the wall opposite the window and tapes the postcard at the end of a neat line of cities and monuments she's never seen. Above is a row of photographs, always of the same two smiling people and half aligned with the postcards. She's been trying to match the two together, backgrounds with places, because then she might know where they are. If she knows that, then maybe Grampa will listen.

It hasn't worked. There aren't enough clues. Naoto traces the line with her finger one more time, then sits on the floor and waits for her parents to come back.

**2.**

It's late spring, at eight o'clock at night, and Naoto's six years old when the policeman in the black cap comes to visit. She's stopped running to the window at the sound of every car that pulls up, so she doesn't notice him until she peers into the visitor's parlor. Yakushiji-san said Grampa wanted her in her best clothes - pressed shorts, braces, crisp white shirt. Perhaps it's for the policeman.

He's sitting in a leather chair opposite Grampa, leaning forward, his voice a low rumble. Naoto wants to listen, wants to help. She's a detective too. When she catches her grandfather's eye, he nods, and she takes that as permission to enter the room.

The policeman turns to glare at her and gestures back towards the door. "A child should not be present." He says it to her grandfather rather than to her. Naoto balls her fists at her sides.

Grampa explains that Naoto is his granddaughter and that she will be the fifth Shirogane detective.

The policeman studies her more closely, then looks back at Grampa. "You must be disappointed that your son only had a daughter."

Her grandfather starts to speak, but Naoto's already running out of the parlor, past the dining room, through the hallway and down the wooden steps at the back of the house. It's already dark outside and the stone lanterns in the gardens don't cast much light. She only runs as far as the oak tree by the lake, thinking to climb it - but she's wearing her good clothes, as she was told. Instead she stops short, scowls, then slams her palms against the bark.

Yakushiji-san soon comes to find her, sitting under the tree and choking back tears. He crouches next to her, and when she finally stops crying, he cleans her face with his handkerchief and leads her indoors.

**3.**

It's early May, at four o'clock in the afternoon, and Naoto's seven years old when her grandfather calls her to his study. It smells like wood and leather and ink. When he isn't working, she sits at his desk and reads the detective novels stacked neatly on the shelves that line the room.

"Your teachers are concerned," he tells her, and both his voice and the look he gives her are as measured as the tick of the clock on the study wall.

The teachers never tell her anything useful. Their lessons are dull and when Naoto raises her hand to ask a question, they ignore her.

"They say you do not talk. That you do not behave appropriately." He pauses, brow furrowed. "That you have no friends at school."

The girls laugh at her, tell her she should grow her hair and wear a dress and stop climbing trees. The boys ignore her, tell her she's too small and too quiet and she should go play with the girls.

"You ought to be spending time with other children, Naoto-kun."

Naoto wants to tell him what the other children say when she tries. Instead she nods and says nothing.

"No child should be so silent," she hears her grandfather murmur below his breath.

**4.****  
**  
It's midsummer, at seven o'clock in the evening, and Naoto's eight years old when she hears Yakushiji-san climbing the stairs. She can tell by his footsteps, soft and irregular. Her grandfather walks like the swing of a pendulum, each step deliberate and in perfect time.

There's a knock at the door to her room and Yakushiji-san enters moments later. He looks at the components and tools scattered in the center of the room: wires, LEDs, pieces of plastic.

"What are you making?" he asks.

She shows him the pen and the flashlight she's tucked into the cap. Yakushiji-san smiles, so Naoto brings out her other tools from under the bed: the detective badge with the hidden camera, the key fob containing a voice recorder, the pocketknife with the radio. She explains that the last one doesn't quite work yet, there's something wrong with the receiver.

"Did you show these to the teachers at school?"

Naoto shakes her head fiercely.

She's been told to ask more questions, show more confidence, talk to the other children. It makes no sense. The questions she does ask either go unanswered, or cause trouble by upsetting the teachers. The other children laughed at the few attempts she made to talk to them. There's no point trying.

"That's a shame. They're very good." Yakushiji-san picks up the pen to examine it. "You're very much like your father," he tells her. When Naoto smiles, he smiles back.

**5.**

It's late November, at six o'clock in the morning, and Naoto's ten years old when she looks through the glass door to the garden. The house is wrapped in silence. Yakushiji-san and Grampa left early for a meeting in the city. Naoto was supposed to be sleeping, but she watched them leave from the bedroom window.

Outside the door there's a fine dusting of frost on the rocks and lanterns and the lake is partially frozen. Most of the trees are just bundles of black limbs against the steel grey sky. It would be wise to remain indoors.

The house has twenty-two rooms. Naoto walks through twenty of them in turn, listening carefully. She does not enter her Grampa's room, or Yakushiji-san's living area. In the rest she hears only silence. That's inaccurate, though. You can't hear silence. And she hears three things: the thud of her heartbeat, the whisper of air with each breath, and the soft shuffle of her socks against the wooden floor.

There are twenty-two rooms, twenty of which she has investigated, and three people. One person, currently.

It's five years since her parents died, she remembers.

**6.**

It's mid August, at eleven o'clock in the morning, and Naoto's eleven years old when she works on her first case. She's been asking Grampa for months if she can be his assistant. He's unwilling. "You are very young," he tells her. Naoto bristles, but doesn't allow it to show.

"Your grandfather wants you to be happy," Yakushiji-san explains later.

She keeps asking. Eventually Grampa relents and begins to call her to the study to show her reports and paperwork. Sometimes he explains old cases to her and the means by which he solved them.

Today, a gentleman from the city comes to visit. He has lost something important to him; something he thinks a former colleague may have taken. Grampa tells the man that this is not the type of case they typically handle but since the man is a friend of the family, they will help him. Naoto is instructed to take notes.

The man looks at Naoto as if suddenly noticing her. "Who is this boy?" he asks.

Her grandfather explains that Naoto is his grandson and he will be helping with the case.

"Ah, your son's child?" The gentleman rubs his beard. "He was a good man." He leans towards Naoto. "I hope you're doing his memory justice, young detective."

Naoto nods, suppressing a grin. She listens diligently, writing down everything that is said in neat, bold characters.

The case turns out to be trivial. The item was not stolen; there was a misunderstanding. An office was cleared out and the item was accidentally transported to a warehouse in another prefecture. The man returns to thank Grampa for his assistance and as he leaves he pauses next to Naoto, places a hand on her shoulder, and congratulates her.

Naoto can't stop smiling for hours afterwards. She's a real detective now. There's a lot of work to do, because she isn't much like the detectives in her grandfather's novels, but time will fix that.

******7.**

It's midwinter, at three o'clock in the afternoon, and Naoto's twelve years old when Yakushiji-san finds her sitting in her grandfather's study scanning a book on police procedures. There are workmen clearing the attic so the roof may be repaired and Naoto dislikes the noise. Besides, she must prepare for the next case. With enough knowledge, perhaps the police will listen. They brush her aside, tell her she's just a boy, insist that she stays out of their business. If they wanted _that_, she thinks, then they ought not to request a detective's help in the first place.

When Yakushiji-san walks in, he's carrying an object in his hand; something made of blue cloth. He sets it on the desk in front of her. It's a peaked cap covered in a fine film of dust.

She asks Yakushiji-san where it's from.

"It was among the items brought down from the attic. I thought you might like it."

Naoto thinks of the policemen that visit the house. Their caps are black, not blue, and the material is stiffer, but the resemblance is still there.

Later, after carefully cleaning the cap, she places it on her head and studies herself in the mirror. She looks more like a grown-up than ever. When she pulls the brim of the cap down over her eyes and stands as tall and straight as she can, she looks almost like the policemen.

Naoto wears the hat constantly after that. Her grandfather asks her why one day and she tells him it's just comfortable.

**8.****  
**  
It's early July, at nine o'clock at night, and Naoto's thirteen years old as she stares in the bathroom mirror, trying to suppress the dread swirling in her stomach.

Naoto has studied biology in anticipation of the physical changes that occur with growth. She did this to spare Yakushiji-san, who is clearly uncomfortable with the topic. The knowledge is no consolation when she realizes her body is altering, firmly marking her out as female. She's been granted some advantages - a slim frame and a boyish face - but she's grown no taller in the past year and the curves in her waist and chest are becoming obvious. Her voice will never break.

This is a disaster. The police have no time for her as it is, and she has no time for herself, if she is to be a girl. To be female is to be soft, sensitive, illogical; to be something Naoto can never hope to comprehend. It doesn't fit. It isn't like the detectives in the novels and it isn't like her. Grampa understands this - knows that a female detective will never be taken seriously - even if this understanding has always remained unspoken. Naoto knows it must exist for him to have assisted her this long - but she cannot rely on his help forever, just as his words can no longer hide the obvious.

Naoto looks in the mirror, hands leaning against the sink, and studies the arcs of her body beneath her increasingly ill-fitting clothes. She runs a hand down the side of her face. Soft skin, wide blue eyes, but the cap will hide those. The rest is a challenge.

Last week, she requested that Yakushiji-san to purchase some supplies: two rolls of bandages, one of medical tape. He didn't question her; he simply left them on top of the cabinet opposite the mirror. Naoto hopes he didn't tell her grandfather.

Most of the cases require their presence in the city, so she'll be switching schools next semester. Nobody there will know her.

The figure in the mirror stares back at her: a thirteen year-old girl in boy's clothing.

Naoto pulls off her shirt, picks up the bandages and begins wrapping them tight around her chest.

******9.**

It's late spring, at six o'clock in the evening, and Naoto's sixteen years old as the train pulls into Inaba station. From the window he sees a scattered sprawl of low buildings and narrow roads.

A young man in a disheveled suit waits for him on the platform, folding into an abrupt half-bow as he approaches. "Tohru Adachi. Welcome to Inaba, Shirogane-san." He offers Naoto an inane grin. "Detective prince, right?"

Voice low in pitch and smooth as ice, Naoto greets him in return. "I understand you need my help."


End file.
